Consumer Entertainment
Enhancing the concert experience
Boomvox set out to deepen the connection between concert-goers and artists. I designed the consumer product end to end, from journey mapping through interface design, working directly with end users, artists, and venue partners.
Ethnographic research
The team and I went to venues, hung out with artists, met with music industry big wigs, and, most importantly, experienced concerts with concert-goers. We discovered the motivation behind attending concerts, which differed depending on demographic.
Validation
After our research, we created the first version of the Boomvox app, which included the basics for validating our research: knowing what kind of interactions would increase interest and connection to the artist, and sales, within the app. Concert-goers had the opportunity to tap around and use the prototype, and field testers made notes on behavior and comments.
Rapid iteration
Discover, understand, make, test, discover. The process repeated over and over again as we discovered more and delivered value to concert-goers. In-concert ads were released to test an increase in downloads and interaction between the artist manager and the attendees, while others in the team handed out cards at other locations to increase downloads and usage. Those cards doubled as posters mounted inside venues, each carrying a QR code and an NFC tap target so people could see what was playing and buy the setlist right from their seat.
The pivot
After discovery and iteration, we learned that the best place to sell the desired connection to the artist was at the time of ticketing, first at purchase, then at entry into the concert. We also uncovered that while the major venues had funding, both the larger and the smaller venues were looking for ways to reduce risk, as attendee numbers weren't consistent. Part of the reason was awareness of artists playing at specific venues, but a major part was the cost of tickets. To have a full social experience, the ticket was only one purchase of many during the night, and many people's budgets couldn't take the full experience.
Tixi
Seeing this, an addition was made to the Boomvox app: Tixi. Tixi was created to spread the cost of entertainment over time for attendees, replace the point of sale for the front door of venues, and act as a selling point for the connection to the artist, the main purpose of Boomvox. Spreading this cost out allowed concert-goers to spend more at the venue.
